Melanie Perkins says the design giant must ‘refound’ itself, as a restructure shifts teams to Sydney and strips out management layers
Canva job cuts will affect 1,271 roles, or 22 per cent of the design company’s global workforce, in the first redundancy round of its 13-year history. Co-founder and chief executive Melanie Perkins told staff about the cuts today (4 November).
Not every affected employee will leave. Perkins said some staff would have their roles changed and others would be asked to move to centralised hubs. Canva has not said how many roles will be made redundant outright.
“This is without doubt the hardest moment in our thirteen-year history,” Perkins wrote in her letter to staff.
Perkins said Canva’s growth had slowed this year for the first time in a decade, and that she had concluded “small changes won’t be enough”.
Canva will merge its product, growth and platform teams into a single product organisation and cut management layers. Sydney will become the main base for more product teams. Hybrid staff will be expected in the office two to three days a week from January.
“We’re simplifying layers, consolidating overlapping responsibilities, and ensuring teams have the right mix of skills and experience for the chapter ahead,” Perkins wrote.
The overhaul follows a difficult year for the company’s valuation. Blackbird, Canva’s largest venture backer, cut its valuation of the company by 17 per cent to US$34.9 billion in August 2026. Investors have been concerned that artificial intelligence will undercut software businesses.
Departing employees will receive at least six months’ salary and 12 months of healthcare where Canva provides it, and can keep their work laptops, according to The Sydney Morning Herald.
The AFR reported that the package also removes the one-year equity vesting cliff. Through a new Canva Collective Fund, departing staff can apply for US$10,000 grants to start their own ventures, news.com.au reported.
Canva is the latest Australian technology company to cut jobs. Atlassian cut 1,600 jobs in March 2026, 480 of them in Australia, and WiseTech Global announced 2,000 job cuts earlier this year.
Both follow broader forecasts that AI and reorganisation are expected to fuel redundancies in 2026, alongside moves such as Telstra’s fresh restructure flagging hundreds of job cuts.
